


Nice Work if You Can Get It

by reserve



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: 1930s, Brooklyn boys in love, First Time, Fluff, Historical, M/M, Miscommunication, Pining, Pre-Serum Steve Rogers, Pre-War, showgirls
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-23
Updated: 2014-11-17
Packaged: 2018-02-22 07:43:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 12,920
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2500028
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/reserve/pseuds/reserve
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bucky Barnes and his best pal Steve Rogers stumble into a situation that leaves Bucky feeling tongue-tied, out of his element, and convinced that Steve—<i>Steve!</i>—has more experience with the ladies than he previously let on. It's terrible.</p><p>(Pre-serum Steve, pre-war Brooklyn, befuddled Bucky, and showgirls, for your pleasure.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> All errors are my own damn fault - please let me know if you see something glaring and terrible. Title comes from the Gershwin song (d. 1937) of the same name: "Loving one who loves you / And then takin' that vow / Nice work if you can get it / And if you get it won't you tell me how?"
> 
> Much love and thanks to Ark, robokittens, allecto, and andwhatyousaid who were all wonderful midwives.

The sound of their shoes hitting the asphalt echoes loudly in the alleyway. It’s barely late afternoon, but the sky is already darkening, and only the slightest bit of sunlight filters down onto the garbage strewn street. Bucky’s pulse thunders in his ears, and he knows that if he’s out of breath then Steve must be close to passing out

He spares a glance over his shoulder, and when no shadows darken the entrance to the alley several yards behind them, Bucky grabs Steve by the back of his ratty peacoat and pulls him to a halt—puts them both flush against the brick wall closest, and couches their sweaty, breathless bodies in the shadow of a large dumpster.

Steve starts to shake him off, pissed as hell, color high on his cheeks. The set of his jaw and the tremble of his lower lip are a sure sign that he’s about to tell off Bucky six ways from Sunday and then some. Bucky’s best pal Steve Rogers doesn’t know when to quit, but Bucky does, and quitting time is _now _.__

“You’re gonna make yourself sick,” he says, before Steve can get his mouth open.

“The hell I am.” Steve glares at him from under soggy, unkempt bangs. He looks like a fever just broken. Bucky can’t look much better, but he’s always been a sweaty kid. Steve squares off his shoulders, and Bucky shoves him lightly.

“There were eight of them, and two of us, Steve.” He inhales sharply through his nose and pictures Steve's head busted open on the ground. “ _Eight of them. _”__

“Knew we’d be faster.” Steve shrugs, dropping his hands to his knees, and crouching down to breathe out his fatigue through a grin.

“No, ya didn’t. Those fellas coulda had guns.”

“Then get better at dice or quit playin', Buck. You’re not exactly a shark.”

He’s right. Bucky is awful at dice, but bringing Steve along was the real bad choice.

“I’m not the one," Bucky says, pointing at himself, "who went and accused someone three times his size of being a scoundrel. _I’m _not the one who decided honor was more important than a few measly pennies.”__

“He was a lousy cheat!” Steve cries, between wheezes. “Couldn’t even manage to fake it. Turned red every time his turn came up. And maybe we coulda used that change you so willingly--”

“Shhhh!” Bucky clamps a clammy hand over Steve’s mouth.

Steve’s eyes widen. He can’t hear all that good, but Bucky’s hearing is damn near uncanny and there are people coming their way. Sounds like six at least, and he’d be willing to put much more than pennies on that.

“Bucky,” Steve says against his palm, and tugs at his arm. “Bucky, lemme go.” It comes out all garbled, but Bucky’s barely listening. His attention is on the street, on the voices that have his senses heightened like a trapped animal’s. He drops his hand from Steve’s mouth with a narrow-eyed look of warning and Steve nods.

“Get behind me,” he whispers, and for once in his life, Steve does as he’s told. Bucky throws both his arms out wide, the back of one flush against Steve’s chest, his other hand curled into a fist.

No more than five minutes have passed since they managed to shake the gang of angry miscreants that started after them once Steve brazenly insulted their ringleader’s honor, and now Joe Lombardi’s crew seems to have caught their scent again.

Bucky can feel Steve’s still-labored breath against the exposed skin above his coat collar and that’s a bad sign if there ever was one.

“Can you run?”

“Yeah. Yeah, Buck.” Steve curls a hand into the wool fabric at Bucky’s side and steadies himself. “I can run.”

“Get ready.”

Steve tugs on his coat in response and turns, putting his back toward Bucky. It’s not even 100 yards to where the alley lets out onto Fulton Street, but the busy pedestrian plaza seems like miles away, and may as well be for Steve. Bucky looks up and around, straining his eyes to see if there’s another way out, or if they’re well and truly trapped. Beyond the dumpster, halfway to salvation, there’s a door just slightly ajar, looks like someone might’ve wedged something beneath it to keep it open.

“Make for that door,” he tells Steve, then prays that Steve can see it with his pisspoor vision. Hell, Bucky might’ve missed the damn thing if he hadn’t been looking.

“What door, Buck?”

The entrance to the alley darkens. There's no time.

“Run!” he shouts, and elbows Steve hard in the back, sending him careening forward into the semi-dark.

“What door?” Steve yells again, voice cracking, feet beating the pavement.

“On the—aw, fuck it.” Bucky turns and hightails it after him, puts their backs foolishly to the encroaching jerks who want their heads. Or their pocket change.

There’s a gunshot, then the sound of a bullet ricocheting off an iron railing.

Steve swears. “ _Holy shit_ , they do have guns.”

Bucky grimaces. He catches up with Steve and hooks an arm around his waist, practically drags him the rest of the way to their escape.

“Gonna teach you a lesson, Rogers!” Someone roars out behind them, likely Lombardi himself. “Someone’s gotta teach that pretty mouth of yours a lesson!”

Their assailants near as they slam bodily into the door that Bucky marked. Bucky’s left shoulder takes most of the impact, and he flings Steve in front of him and inside just as another shot rings out. Bucky follows, practically falls onto Steve in his haste to get away and get safe. He slams the door shut, and turns the blessed deadbolt.

Neither one of them is going to die today.

\--

Despite the fists pounding furiously on the door, Bucky rests his head against the cool metal and wills his heart to slow down. That was close, probably the closest they’ve gotten to getting it good. His blood rushes with sweet relief. He's ok, _Steve's ok_ —

“Bucky.”

“Shhhh.”

“Buck, listen...”

“Gimme a second wouldya—”

“Damnit, Bucky!” Steve hits his shoulder. Hard.

“What?” Bucky whirls around, eyebrows drawn together, and comes up short.

Steve is staring at him with equal parts horror and exhilaration. His chest is heaving, his blue eyes are real wide and there are... _girls_. There are girls all around him and Steve. The kinda girls you see in pictures, or on postcards, or…or in the 8 pagers he maybe keeps stashed under his socks.

“Holy Mary mother of God,” Bucky breathes out.

“Not quite,” says the girl closest to him, and she’s, well—she’s _nothin_ ’ like any of the girls he's seen up close before. Fact is, she’s more of a woman than anyone he’s seen ever.

Bucky swallows down the lump in his throat. He registers music in the background, the sound of laughter, and it occurs to him that they’ve busted in through the back of The Albee, the big old vaudeville theatre on Dekalb. Steve is fidgeting now that he’s got Bucky’s attention and Bucky can’t seem to find his own voice for the life of him. To think they were just being shot at by the dumbest group of mooks this side of the East River.

“What’s your name, tough guy?” The girl asks, and the other broads (there’s more than nine of them, all dressed up like half-nude peacocks) stare at him.

“His name’s Bucky,” says Steve first. “I’m Steve.”

"Elisabeth Sackler,” says the girl, without looking at him, eyes fixed on Bucky so intently he thinks he might start sweating bullets again. “You can call me Sissy. Everyone else does.”

“Sissy,” one of the girls behind her hisses. “Kick ‘em out. We’re gonna catch hell from Vogel if he finds them here.”

“Hush up,” Sissy says over her shoulder.

Bucky shakes his head. Maybe they did get shot.

“Please don’t kick us out,” Steve pleads, putting a gentle, small hand on Sissy’s forearm, and carefully avoiding her many bangles. “Those guys out there….”

“They wanna kill yous?” pipes up the smallest girl in the group, real pretty with olive skin and chestnut hair done up in curls. Closest thing among the flock to the type of girl Bucky might be able to take out.

“Yeah,” Steve murmurs, long eyelashes spread out across his cheeks, plush lips in a full-on pout. It’s an expression that never fails to work on Bucky.

“It’s all my fault.” His voice comes back to him suddenly. “I’m real bad news, I—”

“Don’t listen to him,” Steve butts in. “It’s my fault, trust me.”

“Stevie, you know that ain’t the truth. You’re just sayin’—”

Sissy holds up her palm, rolling her eyes. Half the other girls follow suit, and a few amble away, recentering their elaborate headpieces.

“Our number is up in three minutes. You can lay low in one of the dressing rooms for now but when the show’s over you have to scram. Are we clear?”

“Crystal,” Steve says, utterly sincere. “Thank you.”

“Don’t mention it.” Sissy smiles with a coy lift of one slim, lovely shoulder. "It’s not everyday we’re treated to a pair of good old fashioned ragamuffins.”

She adjusts her glimmering brassiere, and then gestures to the other girl who spoke up. “Louise, can you show our guests the way?”

Louise nods very seriously, and it’s clear to Bucky that Sissy Sackler is in charge around these parts.

“And boys, feel free to watch some of the act if you’d like.” She turns, and the lingering girls take a step back. “Find your places,” she calls out imperiously, any hint of playfulness fallen away. “And don’t get sloppy.”

Steve looks at Bucky expectantly and Bucky shrugs; why the hell not.

Louise guides them further into the wings towards the stage with a secret little smile that becomes a smirk when the lights go down, and the girls take their positions.

Steve is hanging on to the edge of the curtain like he might faint, and Bucky, God help him, has to pick his jaw up off the floor when the dancing really gets going. He inches nearer to Steve—just to make sure he's taking it all ok—because there sure is a lot of shimmying and a lot of vampy snare drum to keep the shimmying in time. Even at Coney Island, with the girls practically naked in their swimsuits, it's more decent than this.

Steve leans into him when he gets close enough, his vise grip on the curtain slackening as he rests more fully against Bucky. Steve's breath is even and deep— _finally_. Bucky drapes an arm across his shoulders, bony even through his coat, and tugs Steve a little bit tighter to his side. He still can't believe they made it out the alley alive, and now here they are, just two fellas enjoying the show. And what a show it is. The stage is a glittering array of sequins and feathers and slender ankles in high heels. Steve is warm against him and not dead. Could be worse.

Behind them, someone whistles high and sweet. Bucky looks over his shoulder and sees Louise waiting patiently, a delicate hand resting on her bare hip. Steve turns too, and the look she gives them is unmistakably fond.

"It's good, right?"

"Yeah," Steve whispers, like speaking at all might break the spell.

Louise's laugh is a bright tinkly sound over the music, and her smile becomes sly again.

"Let's go," she says, her eyes shining in the dark.

\--

They follow Louise to a long flight of precarious looking stairs that make Bucky place a cautious hand at Steve's back. Down into the bowels of the theatre they go. Bucky stays dumbstruck, and he's a talker, anyone will tell you. Maybe his stunned silence is a side effect of their near death experience, or the proximity of breasts, but Steve is doing fine. Better than fine, and it's kind of annoying. Louise keeps up a steady stream of idle chatter, and Steve has a polite inquiry for every pause.

As they wind their way past props and racks of sparkly costumes, Bucky learns that Louise is from Rhode Island (“Moved to the city when my aunt passed, God rest her soul”), that she wound up in the _theeayter_ by accident, that she’s Italian, and that she hates gambling. Maybe not his kinda girl after all, but Steve seems downright taken.

They don't pass all that many folks on the way to the dressing rooms, but the few they do see barely spare them a second glance.

"We're the matinee today," she explains when Steve asks why it's so quiet. “Then we go on again at the end of the night when things really pick up.”

"Always thought a theatre would be more, I dunno..."

"Wild?" Louise supplies with a wink.

Steve nods, blushing.

Bucky couldn't agree more. Both their Mas had told them to stay away from the theatre— _any_ theatre in their neighborhood. Too many strange characters about, is what his Ma had said, but he always figured she'd meant queers. Not pretty, half-naked girls from Rhode Island.

“Well, this is it,” Louise says, pushing open a big door that reads “GIRLS” on the front.

Bucky hesitates. Behind that door lies no man's land, a place where guys like them don't get to tread. Even his little sisters started chasing him and Steve from their bedrooms once they got old enough to know that boys weren't allowed. Crossing that threshold is crossing a line you can't uncross, the difference between being a gent or a cad. And besides all that, it feels wrong, like trying to sneak into a ladies' bathroom the way a common creep might. Bucky ain't a creep.

Louise tsks. “C’mon you two, don’t you wanna take a load off?” She grabs Steve by the hand and pulls him inside, Bucky trailing them. Steve gasps, and that gets him hustling.

“Who does these?” Steve’s asking, eyes roving over beautifully rendered posters of various theatrical acts.

“Whoever Mr. Vogel can get, I guess.” Louis shrugs. “Lotsa different artists come by.”

Some of the posters are faded and peeling, and those look to be over a decade old, but others are crisp and brand new, lovingly tacked up around the room, and lit up by the vanity lights. Unfortunately, the vanities have seen better days.

Steve hums appreciatively. Bucky can see his gears turning, and can’t blame him—pretty girls, possible work, sounds perfect. Somehow it makes him feel a little sour.

Louise takes their coats and urges them to sit. Steve drops onto one of the vanity stools and Bucky eases himself into an overstuffed sofa sitting between two elaborately gilded end tables. To his surprise, Louise doesn’t go back upstairs to join the other girls, instead she pulls a robe on and plops down next to Bucky, doesn’t even bother to cross her legs.

“You’re not in the show?” It’s his first full sentence since they barged in.

“Nah, I’m the alternate, I was on call in case Millie didn’t show up.”

“And Millie showed up,” Bucky ventures.

“Today, but she’s a grab bag at best. I’m in the program four times a week usually.”

“What’s wrong with Millie?” asks Steve.

“She’s a drunk,” Louise stage whispers, hand cupped to her mouth. “And kind of a good time girl, if you get my meaning.” She nudges Bucky with her elbow conspiratorially.

Bucky frowns.

“Say, Louise,” Steve says slowly, as he looks her over unabashedly.

“Uh-huh?”

“Got a pencil and some paper handy?”

Oh no. Bucky knows where this is going. And how in the hell did Steve work out how to talk to girls so good? Especially beautiful ones. He crosses his arms over his chest, and sinks further into the sofa.

“Think so.” Louise gets up and starts to rummage around in one of the vanity drawers. She comes back with a sketchpad—nicer than the one Steve’s got at home—and a stubby pencil, and hands over both.

“That’ll do,” Steve says. “So, um—” he falters for a moment, fiddling with the pages.

Bucky wants to crawl into a hole.

"I guess Buck and I have got some time to kill, and I was wondering,” he clears his throat, “If it’d be ok. Maybe I could draw you? If you want? If you don’t mind?”

_Jesus_. Bucky swallows down a disbelieving snort.

“Sure, Stevie,” Louise says like Steve is her kid brother. “How do you want me?”

Bucky's stomach rolls. No one gets away with calling Steve _Stevie_. No one but him.

“Buck, shove off the couch, wouldya?”

“Sure thing, _Rogers_.” Annoyance knots up his chest, and he raises an eyebrow at Steve as he gets up and moves to another equally overstuffed armchair. “Happy to oblige.”

Steve gives him with an unreadable look that dissolves into that stupid, charming half-smile of his, then he turns back to Louise, the full force of his attention on her and her perfect ringlets, on the tempting curve of her body beneath her silk robe.

Maybe they should’ve tried to make it through to Fulton Street, Bucky thinks grouchily. He watches Steve draw with a strong, confident hand. He watches Steve let Louise make him laugh. The adrenaline from their chase ebbs away, and leaves his limbs feeling heavy, and his shoulder aching from where he made contact with the stagedoor.

Eventually he dozes off.

\--

Bucky wakes with a start. Steve is peering at him, a hand on his shoulder. “Time to go,” he says. “Sissy’s kicking us out just like she promised.”

There’s a crick in Bucky’s neck and his back feels seven kinds of stiff. He groans. “I was kinda hoping this was all a bad dream.”

Behind them, Louise giggles, easy and relaxed.

“Sure ain’t," she says, "and you’ve really gotta go. The other girls want to change.”

Bucky stands up slowly and Steve touches his back reassuringly.

“Not too far to home, you’ll make it.”

Louise leads them out of the theatre a different route than they came in, and up a much safer staircase to the front of the house. The theatre's lobby is a grand affair, resplendent in red velvet and gold fixtures, but Bucky can see that things are a little worse for wear. They go out through the main entrance and stand awkwardly together on Dekalb, Bucky looking between Steve and Louise for some kind of cue.

"It's been swell," Steve says, finally. "Thank you. You'll tell Sissy we're grateful?"

Louise smiles slyly and nods. It's another glimpse at the girl who was watching them from the shadows a few hours ago. She’s still in her robe and her curls are a little mussed up. In the moonlight, she looks extra soft and pretty, and Bucky would be lying if he said he didn’t like the way her mouth curved in a tiny, knowing smirk.

“See you soon?” she says, eyes on Steve.

"Count on it," says Steve back real quickly, and darts in to give her a peck on the cheek.

Bucky nearly swears, nearly swats him upside the back of the head when he stays close to her for a moment longer. With Louise in her slippers, she and Steve are almost of a height—Steve just a hair taller than her. Somehow her smallness makes her all the more appealing, somehow it makes Steve standing next to her all the worse. His stomach rolls again.

He feels a burning need to find out exactly what he slept through


	2. Chapter 2

Steve hums the whole way back to their place. There's a bounce in his awkward gait, and he's got the borrowed sketchbook jammed under his arm like it'll disappear if he doesn't hang on to it tightly.

"Sure are cheerful for someone who got shot at today," Bucky says lightly once they're home, and he's stripping off his shirt and trousers, just about ready to pass out again. Steve is posted up on his own bed, idly flipping through the sketchpad, and now he's whistling. He's _whistling_.

"Hmmm?" Steve makes a distracted sound.

"I said, sure are cheerful for a guy who almost got deaded."

Steve tilts his head at him consideringly.

"Can't a guy have a good night?"

"Oh absolutely, I'm a _big_ fan of good nights." Bucky leers at him.

Steve's mouth turns down at one side

"Whaddya mean by that?"

"Nothing, pal. I don't mean anything."

"You sure?" Steve's tone is sharp.

"Positive. And yanno what?"

"What?"

"It was a pretty good night."

 _And I'm a goddamn liar_ , is the thought that follows him to sleep. He's never had a reason to lie to Steve before, and he can't put a finger on what has him so put out. Even in dreams he’s haunted by Steve and Louise, curled into one another on the dressing room sofa like he suspects they were after slumber overtook him. And he knows how goddamn unlikely his suspicions are, at least given what he knows about Steve—which is a hellova lot—but _still_. And when he wakes in the middle of the night to the sound of Steve's noisy breath, his dick hard and curving up against his stomach, his head spinning with half-remembered dreams, he feels alarmed and even more at odds with himself.

\--

The following Monday evening he finds Steve meticulously organizing his pencils and watercolor palettes. On the kitchen table, the leather tool roll Mrs. Rogers gave him when he started art school is spread out and scrubbed clean of its usual charcoal grime. Steve is a tidy person—sometimes much to Bucky's annoyance—but the care he's demonstrating tonight is beyond the norm even for him. His tongue is caught between his teeth, and his brow is furrowed in concentration, and he even has all of his paintbrushes soaking in their one vase, another remnant of his mother.

Bucky takes in the whole scene and whistles low when Steve doesn't so much as bob his head in greeting.

"Someone hire you to paint the Sistine Chapel?"

"Think somebody already painted it, Buck."

"Huh." Bucky clicks his tongue, and drops his lunch pail on the counter with a clang. "Thought your painting class finished for the semester."

Steve hums absently. "That's right."

Bucky frowns as he pulls out one of their two crappy kitchen chairs and flips it around so he can rest his arms along the chair back and keep out of Steve's way.

"So what's with all the—" he gestures at the covered table.

Steve looks up from wiping down his pastels with a damp cloth, and offers an ambiguous smile that sends Bucky's heart unexpectedly off to the races.

"Vogel hired me."

"Vogel? You mean Vogel at the. At the Albee?" _No, no, no, no..._

"He hired me to do the posters and programs for the whole season... Louise showed him some of my drawings, really talked me up, and Vogel liked what he saw, I guess. Even gave me a desk to work at."

"Oh, wow," Bucky says, utterly crestfallen.

Steve is barely able to contain his smile. "He told me to get cracking straight away. And it pays well...it pays _real_ well. Can you believe it, Buck?" He shakes his head like he can barely believe it himself.

"'Course I can, Stevie, you're a real talent. A regular Rembrandt." He reaches out and ruffles Steve's hair. His heart sinks.

\---

Bucky declines over a month's worth of invitations back to the Albee.

He'd felt so out of his element there the first time around that it left him reeling for days, barely able to look at Steve or explain why. Sure, it was a _magical experience_ , as Steve keeps insisting, if you like the kind of magic that leaves you feeling magically unlike yourself, tongue-tied and idiotic.

He keeps going over the day in his mind. Was it the girls? Could it have been all those pretty girls? He’s never had a problem with girls before. Hell, he’d felt real comfortable as a snotnosed kid with his mother and all the neighbor ladies when they got together for their games of euchre and glasses of peach schnapps. In his parents' apartment, squeezed between Mrs. McMullen and Miss Gladys on the dusty sofa, in a room that smelled like face powder, cabbage, and stale tenement air, he'd felt more at ease than he had with Sissy and Louise.

It smarts, that he felt more like himself, more like good ‘ol Bucky Barnes, in short pants with middle-aged ladies fussing over his one persistent cowlick than he did surrounded by some of the most gorgeous dames he'd ever laid eyes on, and isn't that the rub.

Thing of it is, Bucky is a big talker, and he's certainly kissed the girls (and even made them cry), but when it comes to doing much more than kissing, he's not exactly an expert. Thing of it is, he'd always _assumed_ he was more experienced than Steve, and now that he's not so sure it's gnawing at him. Is it possible that Steve's been holding out on him when _he's_ always kissed and told? The more he stews the more often he comes back to Louise and her rumpled curls and her comfortable charm, the clearer the picture of her and Steve in his mind becomes, and the more vivid his dreams get. He can't look at Steve without imagining him trailing one slender hand over Louise's breasts, or fisting a hand in her hair as he laboriously pushes into her.

Bucky has never pictured Steve having any kind of...sexual relations, certainly not extensively, and it’s troubling how easily the images come to him. Like they’ve always been there.

At the Domino plant, hauling heavy crates of sugarcane across the factory storeroom, he finds himself irritable, and trapped in fantasies he doesn't even want. If he gets too wrapped up in them he'll end up hurting himself; he's distracted to the point of accident and that won't do. Not when he has Steve to think about.

So of course he loses _his_ job. Of course he does.

He's lost somewhere between Steve and Louise, her hands at his waist and skimming lower—and then she's gone. It's just him and Steve, pressed together all the way from chest to knee. Steve's hands are in his hair and he's mouthing wetly along Bucky's collarbones; it's agonizingly good, it's agonizingly what he wants.

In reality, in the sugar plant, Bucky feels his face flush and his work pants tighten; that's when he drops a crate on the foreman's foot.

 _Oh_ , he thinks miserably, trudging home along Kent Avenue still red in the face with shame, _so that's how it is_. He presses the heel of his hand hard into his eyes and wipes away stubborn tears. It all seems disgustingly obvious now.

\---

Bucky puts the coffeepot on when he comes home to an empty apartment. Steve must be at class or the Albee which are the only two places he seems to go these days. It’s either CUNY, or the theatre, and Bucky doesn’t feel particularly welcome at either. It weighs on him, but at least Steve isn’t there to see his puffy, red eyes, and know he’s been crying like a babe for the past hour. At least Steve isn't there to see Bucky avoid his gaze, newly insecure and dizzy with lust.

The coffeepot starts to perk and he waits the requisite eight minutes before pulling it off the stove top, and pouring strong black coffee into the chipped mug Steve’s ma gave him before she passed. If he still had a job he’d be on break right now, enjoying a smoke, and tepid coffee from his thermos with the other fellas.

Bucky resists the urge to drop his head into his hands and mope. Instead, he gathers himself up, and splashes cold water over his face at the kitchen sink. He pulls the dingy quilt off their sofa, grabs his Luckies, a book, and the mug, and takes himself out onto the fire escape.

Outside, he curls up with his back against this crumbling brick, and his workboots against the iron railing. He tucks the blanket around himself to keep the chill at bay, lights up a cigarette and wills away lingering arousal that won't quit. The cold air feels good on his hot face, and the coffee mug feels good in his cold hands. The cigarette smoke tugs the chilly air into his lungs with each drag, and he wishes he could burn his feelings away.

Williamsburg and the Domino plant feel very distant even though he’s still sore about the whole thing. He’s sore about Steve and he’s sore about Louise, and he’s extra sore about wanting Steve all to himself for reasons that go well beyond friendship. He's sore all around, right down to his heart.

\---

After much deliberation, he decides to lie about losing his job. Bucky lies to Steve for 4 whole days.

He wakes up early just like normal, fixes them both a couple of lousy little sandwiches to take for lunch, and then waves Steve off for the long trip to his morning figure drawing class. Then he walks—aimless, fraught strolls around the neighborhood, even the seedier parts. He considers dice games and thinks better of it. He considers the haunts where guys with untoward feelings toward their best friends might go, and thinks better of that too. Instead Bucky settles for shamefully jerking off in their bathroom before Steve gets home, a towel that smells just a little bit like him clutched in his other fist.

He feels guiltier than a fox in a henhouse.

Lying to Steve feels worse than lying to his Ma about skipping catechism the few times he snuck out to see the Dodgers. It feels worse than when he stole a set of drawing pencils from Namm’s the Christmas he was too broke get Steve a gift. It feels worse than all of that and then some but he's so damn humiliated he can't get his mouth to work, and he can't come clean if his lips won't budge. He's lost his job and he lost it 'cause he can't stop thinking about his best friend in a thousand unsavory ways. How's a fella supposed to spit that out?

Over breakfast, on the fifth day of Bucky’s ruse, Steve manages to get the less damning half of it out of him.

“Buck,” he says, real nonchalant with a piece of toast in hand, “I got some of the wash done yesterday.”

“That’s nice,” Bucky says, distracted by Steve’s little wrists and his floppy hair in the morning light.

“Noticed your work pants weren't very sticky.”

“ _What_?”

“With sugar,” Steve clarifies. “There wasn't any sap on your pants.” He shrugs. “Usually you’re covered in the stuff.”

“Oh.”

Steve lifts an eyebrow, waiting, patient.

“Might’ve gotten fired,” Bucky mumbles.

“Might’ve?”

“Got fired,” Bucky concedes, looking down at his own toast.

“Happens.” Steve shrugs again.

“Yeah.”

“Vogel’s looking for a strong type to help out backstage,” Steve says, slowly, like he’s testing the waters. “Could be nice; heard the money’s not bad.”

Bucky makes a noncommittal sound.

“You could come by, check it out,” he adds.

“Maybe.”

“Be nice to see you more often.”

And that’s a crack in Bucky’s resolve if there ever was one; because they might live together, but it often feels like they’re two ships passing.

“Sure, Stevie. I’ll check it out.”

“Good,” Steve grins. “Bet the girls'll really take to you. I think everyone’s getting a little sick of me and all my drawing.”

“Nah,” Bucky says, smiling back. “Bet they ain’t.”

\---

A few days later, Bucky makes good on his word and shows up at the Albee. He’s later than he meant to be, well past six o’clock, but he's there, back in the alley where it all began.

It’s Sissy Sackler who finds him pacing helplessly outside the stagedoor, and he starts when the door opens and light spills out onto the dim street.

“Hey tough guy,” Sissy says softly.

“It’s Bucky. Bucky Barnes. James, actually.”

She smiles. “I remember.”

Bucky takes his hat off and swipes a hand through his hair, pushing it back from his forehead.

“Looking for your friend?”

“Nah. I mean, Steve said―”

Sissy looks at him expectantly from the doorway while he wrings his hat in his hands, the coarse wool scraping his palms. Her blonde hair isn’t pinned up, and it falls in loose waves past her shoulders. She’s not in costume, but her makeup is done and her slim, patterned belt makes her waist look impossibly tiny. She’s a little older than he realized, and she's very tall, and also very beautiful.

“Cat got your tongue?” She tries.

“Steve said there might be some work,” Bucky says real fast. “That maybe Mr. Vogel was looking for a stagehand type? Someone to move around heavy props or, or something. I know it's late but I was—.”

Sissy cuts him off. “That’s right; did you want to talk to him?”

“If I could.”

“He’s not in, and I’m not certain he’ll be back tonight, but you could come to the office and wait for a bit, if you’d like. You look like you could use a cup of coffee.” She raises a perfectly manicured, equally blonde eyebrow. “Or a stiff drink?”

“I’ve got the jitters bad enough already, ma’am,” Bucky says and immediately regrets the formality.

Sissy’s smile widens. “How ‘bout that drink then? You can tell me all about it.”

“Doesn’t seem right, to drink before meeting a potential boss.”

“Believe me.” Sissy winks, her blue eyeshadow visible in the interior light. “I’m more of an authority than Vogel, and you look like you need a strong remedy.”

\--

The theatre’s office reminds Bucky of his spinster aunt’s claustrophobic Lower East Side apartment. The lamps are all covered with sheer fabric or decorated with tassels, and they cast the room in an eerie glow. There’s a miniature, very old-fashioned ice box in a corner, and one gas burner on a cluttered countertop. A pair of busted up sofas bracket a second door, which has a beaded curtain strung up across it. There are posters on the walls, decorative oriental fans spread out and pinned to the fading wallpaper, and a piece of twine hung clear across the room and laden down with ladies' underthings. The overhead light is a bare bulb which someone has painted red. Sissy urges him to sit and he does, awkwardly on one of the sofa arms.

She goes to the counter and takes down two glass tumblers decorated with chipped gold filigree.

"What's your poison, kiddo?"

"Whiskey, I suppose." Bucky shrugs. He's more of a beer drinker himself but he knows ladies don't usually go in for that sort of thing.

"A sophisticate," Sissy says teasingly over her shoulder at him as she pours them both two fingers of dark liquor.

"Aren't you performing today?" He asks as she offers him a glass.

Sissy sighs, and sits down tiredly on the couch. “My new act is still in rehearsals. Today,” she gestures at a wooden vanity covered with papers and a thick ledger, “is paperwork day. It’s tedious.”

“I’ll bet,” Bucky agrees. He was good at math, a strong student for sure, but he’s never enjoyed busy work. He likes to get his hands dirty, always has.

“Cheers,” Sissy says, raising her glass. “To future employment?”

“To future employment.”

They clink their glasses together.

As it turns out, Vogel doesn’t come back to the theatre, and Bucky ends up spending several hours with Sissy. They drink whiskeys and water, and she pulls out a plate of liverwurst and onions with thickly sliced rye bread at some point in the evening. She’s likable, and easy to talk to. Like his little sister Rebecca, there’s a whip smart girl beneath her intimidating surface.

They never actually get around to discussing what has Bucky so on edge (Steve), but Sissy is telling him about the theatre, which is actually in dire financial straits, when the bedraggled looking cuckoo clock above the counter sings out the hour at nine o’clock. A clunking sound follows from the room beyond the beaded a curtain, and then a little face haloed by tangled blonde hair peers out at them.

“Mama?”

Sissy’s brow furrows, and she puts her glass down, and pats her lap.

“My daughter,” she says to Bucky. “Come and meet our new friend, Alice.”

Alice, who can’t be more than five, ambles over to them a bit unsteadily in a long white nightgown. She looks sleepy and maybe a little ill, with dark circles beneath her big, blue eyes. She looks sick like Steve does when he’s going through a particularly bad episode of whooping cough.

“Hello,” Alice says weakly as Sissy pulls her into her lap. She curls up against her mother’s chest as a racking cough shakes her tiny body, and Sissy immediately pulls a quilt off the back of the sofa and covers them both with it.

“Hello, Miss Alice.” Bucky dips his head at her.

Sissy pets Alice’s messy hair, and kisses her brow. “Alice isn’t well,” she explains, eyes sad.

Bucky hums sympathetically. He’s all too familiar with loving someone who has never known a year without being dogged by illness. He takes them both in, how tender Sissy’s expression is, then it dawns on him—

“Do you live here?” he asks before he can stop himself.

“We do.”

 _No wonder_ the office looks so much like an apartment.

“Oh.” Bucky frowns. “I don’t wanna pry, but—”

Sissy shrugs, careful not to disturb Alice. “I keep the books for Vogel, I choreograph most of the dancing girl acts, and I stay here for a minimal fee. It’s not much, but it’s better than where we were before.”

“Which was?”

“My oaf of a husband—ex-husband’s—house. He wasn’t exactly the kindest guy. And he didn’t like having a sickly little girl around. Said it was my fault, because I kept on at the theatre before I started to show. Not the sharpest tool in the shed, on top of everything else.”

“Careful,” Bucky says, “better not tell Steve about him; he’ll march off and give him a piece of his mind on your behalf. He’s really taken with you all."

Sissy laughs softly. “I think he already has.”

“Oh?”

“Lombardi? Your cheating dice opponent? I’d know his voice from miles away. He’s the one who chased you to our door, and the reason I eyed you so hard when you burst in on us. I thought you might be one of his new boys coming to shake me up. Turns out it was probably the nicest thing Joe's done for me since giving me Alice—bringing Steve to us, that is, and you too, maybe."

Bucky stares at her in the dim light, at Alice's little tow head. It seems downright impossible that a woman like Sissy Sackler would look twice at a creep like Lombardi.

"Do you mean to tell me," he begins slowly, "that Joe Lombardi, sweaty-even-in-the-dead-of-winter with a neck like a tree trunk and a head just as thick...do you mean to tell me that _that_ Joe Lombardi is Alice's father and your ex-husband?"

"The very same," says Sissy serenely. 

"But Miss Sackler, that's—"

"For the tenth time, call me Sissy."

Bucky downs the rest of his whiskey.

"I know, I know," Sissy sighs, "but you'll understand someday, how funny things like that happen. Things like me and Joe. Love makes us all fools."

"I think I understand a little," Bucky says, thinking of Steve and the one billion reasons why he should think of anyone but him.

"Then be careful, tough guy," Sissy says kindly, "some kinds of love wind up causing more pain than pleasure in the end."

Bucky breathes out a heavy sigh of his own as Alice stirs against Sissy's chest and mumbles something into her neck.

"I suppose I should get going," he says, putting his cap back on and getting to his feet. "Steve'll be wondering after me."

"Listen, come back tomorrow and I'll tell Vogel that I brought you on, ok? You're a nice young man; we can always use more of those around these parts."

Bucky grins, and nods firmly at her. "I will," he says, "and thank you, for the drinks and the conversation. I don't get to talk to a lotta of dames like you."

"I find that very hard to believe." Sissy winks.


	3. Chapter 3

The panic sets in as Bucky is standing in front of their cracked bathroom mirror and slicking back his hair.

He's always been a confident sort, reasonably nice looking in his own opinion, good with people...but now there's a Steve Rogers shaped crack in his confidence that surely wasn't there before, and it's doing him in. He feels queasy, and he hasn't even told Steve he took the damn job at the Albee yet. Bucky figures he's racking up all kinds of strikes in the good book, and that's not counting the times he promised this girl or that one that he'd call and never did, or his much more troubling feelings for Steve.

The bathroom mirror reflects shadowed blue eyes, and a troubled gaze. He looks like he hasn't slept in days, and a clean shave doesn't help matters much. Bucky still looks exactly how he feels: nervous as hell. When he got home the night before Steve had glanced up from his book, raised an eyebrow, and nodded towards a covered plate on the kitchen table and a glass of milk that was undoubtedly warm at some point. Bucky had swallowed the milk down in a few gulps and stashed the plate in the refrigerator.

They'd spent the remainder of the evening in awkward silence, Bucky mending his good suspenders in preparation for the following day, and Steve sprawled out in the couch and buried in his novel. The radio played softly in the background because Steve would be damned if he didn't know exactly what was going on in Europe at all times, and Bucky was keen to know the news abroad too. He was genuinely relieved (and a bit irked), that Steve hadn't asked where he'd been, didn’t mention the alcohol on his breath, and didn't seem the slightest bit curious either. _He'd_ certainly want to know where Steve had been if he came home late unexpectedly. Lord, he'd keep a bell on Steve if he could, with the way he was always getting into scrapes and getting his face mussed up.

At least, Bucky thinks grimly, this new job will make keeping an eye on Steve much easier. But keeping an eye on him when he can barely look at Steve without breaking into a sweat won't be easy at all. _Oh brother_.

He makes resolute eye contact with himself in the mirror and puts the finishing touches on his hair. Gets his satchel and his wool coat and puts his cap on gingerly to keep his carefully styled strands in place. Steve is already gone for the day, with the promise of a picture show later if Bucky wants, and Bucky knows he won't be at the theatre when he gets there, which fills him with heady relief. Without Steve he'll have a day to get his bearings free from the danger of distraction.

Bucky stops short on his way out the door and drags both hands over his face, pulling down his eyelids.

"Ugh, why'd you do this, Barnes?" He says aloud.

But he knows why. Despite how much it'll hurt to see Steve and Louise making moon eyes at each other every chance they get (which he can only imagine a they will be), he's not about to pass up the chance to spend more time around the guy. And then there's Sissy, who is so encouraging and seems so confident in him, like the older sister he'd want if he could choose one. He wants to be the kind of guy someone like Sissy can rely on. He inhales deep and steady.

To hell with it, he will be.

\--

Louise is so damn pleased to see him when he gets to the Albee that Bucky nearly bolts. She flings her arms around his neck, gets up on her tip-toes, and buries her face in his neck like he’s her long-lost sweetheart. The breathy way she says his name against his ear feels like a promise, and the sensation makes him shiver.

She's a piece of work. 

He puts both hands on her hips and gently moves her a bit away from right against him. She smells like perfume, like girl; her closeness alone is bewildering.

"Hiya, Louise," he says, cheeks pinking. "You look well."  
  
She preens a little, and brushes a stray hair out of her enormous green eyes. "Ain't the alternate anymore. Sissy gave me a real part all my own."  
  
"That's swell," says Bucky, and is surprised to find he means it. He drops his hands from her full hips and shoves them deep into his pockets, takes a step back.    
  
"Isn't it just?" Louise grins, all white teeth sparkle. "When I told Stevie he went right out and bought me flowers."   
  
"That so?" Bucky's chest tightens.   
  
"And they were dahlias, too. That's some friend you've got there...whatta guy."  
  
"Been saying that for years." He takes a shaky breath and smiles back at her, all the way up to his eyes. It feels like a grimace.   
  
"Bout time someone noticed and told him, eh?" Louise says and nudges him with her elbow, the same conspiratorial gesture she'd made the night they met.   
  
"Couldn't agree more."   
  
That's when Sissy swoops in and saves him. He couldn't be more grateful when she takes him by the arm and shoos Louise away.   
  
"Let's introduce you to Hans, shall we?" She says, with a pointed look at Louise that clearly says don't follow.

\--

Hans, Bucky learns, is the oft mentioned Mr. Vogel, owner of the Albee. And Hans Vogel is portly, mustachioed, red-faced, and for his part doing the best impression of a walrus that a human can muster without a costume. He's sputtering on the telephone when Sissy knocks on his office doorframe with Bucky in tow, and he looks just about ready to flip his lid at whomever he's speaking to.

Vogel holds up a meaty hand at them to wait a minute and Sissy shrugs.

“It’s always like this. There’s not a day of the week that something doesn’t have him put out.”

“Must be rough, running a place like this.” Bucky shrugs in return, and Sissy nods in agreement and placidly folds her arms over her chest, unfazed by the thickly accented yelling happening before them.  

Vogel’s office is set back in the wings on the opposite side of the theatre from the stage door. Like Sissy’s office-come-apartment, it’s intensely cluttered with papers and ledgers. And like the girls’ dressing room, the walls are covered in posters with the addition of a very well-rendered painting of a pug dog, which Bucky can only assume is Vogel’s beloved pet.

There’s a loud ringing sound as Vogel slams the phone back into its cradle, then he groans, and waves them both into the room and before his desk.

“Oh Sissy, _Weh mir_ , how can a city be so full to the brim with idiots?” He rolls his eyes skyward. “Thank _Gott_ for you, my dear.” He gestures to two high-backed leather chairs in front of him. “Sit, sit, please. This is the boy?”

“James Barnes,” says Bucky.

“And he’s a grown man,” Sissy corrects. “Isn’t that right?”

“Well, I’m 19.”

Vogel nods appraisingly, his chin wrinkling. “Good, very good. And you are strong?” He lifts up his arms like a prizefighter showing off in the ring.

“Yes, sir.” He is strong, it’s one thing Bucky knows he's got going for him.

“Good. This is hard work, but I can tell you’ll do fine, very fine." He smiles broadly at them, his big mustache flaring out over his lips. " _Willkommen_!”

Bucky stands and offers his hand, which Vogel takes and shakes vigorously, his eyes bright behind his little half-moon spectacles.

“Thanks so much,” Bucky says as relief rushes through him. He's in. It's over. 

The phone starts ringing again, shrill and loud, and Vogel waves them from the room just as he waved them in. “Go on, show him where to store his things. There’s work to be done. Always, always..."  

They're almost out the door when Vogel clears his throat and says absently, "Keep this one away from the girls, Sissy. He's better looking than the little blonde one."

"Hey now, his name's—"

Sissy cuts him off with a sharp look. "Don't worry, Hans," she singsongs. "He'll be no trouble at all."

His name's Steve, Bucky thinks loudly. _And he looks just fine_.

\--

Sissy takes him around the theatre and introduces him to the other stagehands and to some of the girls who are hanging around. Most of the girls ignore him but a few offer up a wink. Even one of the stagehands gives him a passing once over and Bucky feels his face redden again.

Sissy smiles ruefully at him as she’s showing him the hook for his coat and the cubby for his satchel.

“You’ll get used to it.”

“Right,” says Bucky, thinking he could maybe get too used to it.

“Takes all kinds,” Sissy adds.

“Right,” Bucky says again, and it comes out strangled.

\---

They're seeing Snow White for the fifth time.

Steve's in a cheerful mood, and doesn't seem to have a lot of fight in him. Bucky thinks they could even go to bar after the picture if they wanted to and there wouldn't be any trouble. Still, he can never tell what's going to set Steve off enough to start telling someone off.

The movie comes to Steve's favorite part—when the Prince kisses a poisoned Snow White and she miraculously wakes—and he looks over at Bucky like Bucky put the scene there just for him. That look starts up a tickle in his chest that only Steve can incite. He knows it’s hopeless, that it's likely Steve smiles like that for everyone (for _Louise_ ), but it always hits him hardest in the quiet moments.

He's so smitten.

"Took that job," he says around a mouthful of popcorn as they're leaving the movie theatre. He's finishing up the last of his bag, not a about to waste 3 cents.

Steve turns a brilliant grin on him. Big and white in the lamplight with startlingly straight teeth for someone who’s  suffered so many bouts of illness.

"Really, Bucky?"

"Mmmhmmm."

"Knew Vogel’d want you," Steve says, and claps him on the shoulder. "That's aces, Buck. I'm so glad."

"How's about a drink to celebrate?" Bucky suggests against his better judgement—God knows what’s likely to spill out of him if he’s got a few stiff ones down.

Steve considers his offer as they're standing across the way from the only dive in their neighborhood that's willing to serve them.  A guy as young looking as Steve is bound to have a hard time getting a drink, and the barkeep at The Delancey is only willing because he was sweet on Sarah Rogers before she passed. Bucky can't blame him; Steve's ma was lovely and kind and always brought around whatever she could spare during the holidays, even when things were real bad back when they were kids.  

Steve shivers and rubs at his arms. "May as well warm up before we walk home."

“Attaboy! And your ol'pal Bucky’s buying.”

“Ain’t it you we’re celebrating?” Steve looks up at him, his teeth chattering.

“Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth, kid.”

Bucky slings an arm around Steve’s shoulders, and pulls him close to share what body heat he can.

The lamps outside the bar are still gaslit like lots of places Downtown and the little flames cast a warm glow across the scratched up wooden door. Bucky pushes it open and guides Steve inside with a squeeze at his shoulder. Steve sticks close against him in the dusky bar, and absurd hope surges in his chest. He feels instantly stupid. It's _Steve_ and him and Steve could measure out their friendship in casual contact—Bucky’s always been an affectionate kinda guy, comes with having loads of sisters—and they’ve been drinking all kinds of beverages side by side since they were in short pants. From milk to first communion wine, to cider and watery beer, they’ve had it all. Only difference tonight is that it's the first time they've really gone out since Bucky fell ass over tea kettle for Steve.

This was a bad idea, he thinks, as he orders a round of beer and whiskey for them both, and Steve looks at him kind of tenderly. This was a real bad idea, he thinks, as he orders a third round and Steve has slumped into him until he’s closer to being in Bucky’s lap than on his own barstool.

“That Louise,” Steve slurs at him, gesturing with his beer, “is a _hellova_ dame.”

“Yeah, she’s something else,” Bucky agrees, none too intelligible himself.

“Jeez Louise, yanno?”

Bucky motions for another whiskey, just one for him. “I know,” he says to Steve glumly.

“Really fits her. Jeeeez, Louise.” Steve laughs at the drawn out ees.

“You like her?” Bucky looks at him out the corner of his eye.

Steve nods exaggeratedly. “She’s really...she's real pretty.”

“Yeah, Stevie, she is.” This was a really, really bad idea.

“Dunno—” Steve hiccups, and peers earnestly at Bucky from under his bangs— ”why she lets a punk like me hang around.”

“Bet I do,” Bucky says, and discreetly drops enough cash on the bar to pay their tab. “It’s cause she thinks you’re swell.”

“You think so?”

“Sure I do. She must, because I think you’re,” Bucky stops.

Steve gets unsteadily to his feet.

“I think you’re swell, too,” he finishes thickly, his tongue too big for his mouth.

Steve just laughs at him, can’t see his blush with his bad eyes in the dark bar. He puts both his hands on Bucky’s shoulders and tips his head back to look him full in the face.

“That’s your job, Buck. Best friend’s burden.” Steve hiccups again and sways into Bucky’s chest. “I think you’re—” he giggles, shoulders shaking— ”swell, too.”

“ _Jeez, Louise_ ,” Bucky huffs and makes sure his suddenly interested dick isn’t anywhere near Steve. In fact, he makes sure their lower halves have a good foot between them, and when they get home, he changes in the bathroom while Steve snickers away on his bed.

Never mind bad ideas; this was the worst idea.


	4. Chapter 4

It’s strange, but now that they work at the same place Bucky sees Steve even less. 

After the night at the bar and all of Steve’s talk about Louise, Bucky might be, just _might_ be, avoiding him, but that’s neither here nor there. If he were, though, it’s especially when Steve’s down with the girls in their dressing room, or drawing from the audience during rehearsals. It’s not hard to keep out of the way, he’s usually helping rig lights from the catwalk with careful precision (and where he has a bird’s eye view of Steve), or he’s clearing out the concessions stand, or building props in the woodshop, where the head carpenter has really taken to him. As it turns out, a theatre has loads of places to slip away to, intentionally or not, and although that works in his favor, the thought leaves Bucky cold, because he certainly he can’t find Steve and Louise all of the time either.  

Despite his constant Steve-related anxiety, life at the Albee is good. And it’s nice not being covered in sugar all the time. Bucky much prefers sparkles, sawdust, and good old fashioned grime to the horrible sticky layer of sugarcane detritus that used to follow him home from the Domino plant. Vogel is a fair boss, and the money’s not bad just like Steve said; more’s the pity that Bucky can’t spend all that money on Steve. 

Worst of all, though, is that the more he thrives at work, and Steve too, the quieter they get at home. It might be that Bucky doesn’t trust himself to talk all the much, but that’s neither here nor there, too. Every time they’re alone together with the lights on, Steve’s got his eyes on Bucky like he thinks Bucky just about ready to lose it, which only serves to make him less likely to start up a real conversation. Instead he makes jokes, he tries to feel normal, he doesn’t make eye contact and he damn near loses it every time he and Steve are apart and he’s got the day to himself. ‘Course Steve doesn’t have to know that. No one’s gotta know that. 

Weeks pass, then months. It’s the dead of January in the middle of the coldest Brooklyn weather Bucky can remember, when Alice gets real sick. He worries that Steve will follow and makes him stay home despite virulent protests until the cold spell passes. He’s been saving up his money just in case Steve does get laid up and Bucky needs to cover their rent for a while, but Steve makes it through the month just fine, and eventually, he goes back to work. Bucky doesn’t need to dip into the pretty nest egg he’s got stuffed under his mattress after all. 

Alice doesn’t get better, though. She languishes in the gloomy upstairs apartment, and Bucky watches Sissy start to wilt as her daughter’s illness lingers. No one says it, no one even whispers it, but Bucky remembers what tuberculosis looks like, and Alice has it. Just like Sarah Rogers did, and just like he worries Steve might some day. 

Grief doesn’t suit Sissy, but it hangs around her like a shroud. Bucky sees her in the midst of a tearful conversation with Vogel, and after that Louise takes over the choreography and Sissy keeps to her apartment, managing the finances and bookings. She grows even thinner in what feels like days, and Bucky aches for her. So does Steve, so do all the denizens of the Albee. But they don’t talk about it, the stigma is just too great. He visits when he can, and sits with her in the dingy living room, he does the shopping for her and Alice. He’s a good caretaker, and Sissy tells him as much.  

It doesn’t feel real, Sissy and Alice’s shared decline, until Bucky finds her bloodied up, her lovely face mottled with bruises, when he comes to see them on a Sunday afternoon. 

Sissy covers her face when she lets him in, and Bucky has to stop himself from dropping the groceries he’s brought along. 

“Jesus, Mary an’ Joseph, what happened to you?” 

Sissy rubs gingerly at her forehead, and gathers her housecoat around her. “Same thing that used to happen all the time.” 

Bucky puts the paper bags on the counter, and goes to her. “Joe Lombardi.”   

Sissy nods, and Bucky swears. 

“Are you ok?” 

“I will be.” She sighs, and cringes as her shoulders rise and fall. She probably weighs about as much as Steve now, who’s just a bit of nothing himself. 

They sit together on the sofa and Sissy curls into herself, a shadow of the brassy no-nonsense broad he knows she is. 

“Why’d you go and see him, Sissy? What were you thinking? I mean, Christ, look at you.” 

“Alice isn’t getting any better. I want to take her West, to warmer weather and clearer air. But I can’t…” she trails off. 

“You can’t afford it,” Bucky finishes for her. 

Sissy looks ashamed. “He might be scum, but Joe’s got money. I thought he might help us. What with Alice being his own little girl and all.” 

“No dice?” 

Sissy laughs bitterly. “Only the kind of telling off he specializes in unfortunately.” 

“Christ,” Bucky says again, his brow creasing. “I’ve got a little money I could give you," he adds quickly before he can regret it. "I mean, if you really need it, if you've really gotta go."

Sissy tilts her head at him.

"Bucky,” she whispers and reaches for him. " _James_ , you could come with us." She curls her hands into the front of his work shirt. He can see bruises on her wrists. "You and me and Alice. We could all go West together."

 _Oh God_ , Bucky would. He would go. Sissy is beautiful and kind and she deserves better than what Brooklyn has given her; and he loves Alice too. He does. But he could never leave Steve, not like that. Maybe if he gets called up one day, if the war gets real bad and he had to go, but he'd never leave Steve like this, especially not in the middle of winter, with shoddy heat and not enough blankets to keep the chill out of their drafty firetrap of an apartment. 

"Jeez, Sissy," he says nervously. "I would... I would go. I've always wanted to see the Pacific." He touches her shoulder gently, so as not to cause any more hurt, and covers one of the hands gripping his shirt with his own. "But I've got someone here who needs caring for. Maybe they don't know it, but they need me. You’re not scared, are you? A courageous girl like you?"

"Oh Bucky, I'm not afraid, but no one wants to go into the unknown alone." Her forehead wrinkles up and her  mouth becomes a distraught frown. 

Then Bucky remembers. 

"I've got cousins in Santa Monica," he says, filled with relief, and the sense of knowing he’s said just the right thing. "They've got a pair of girl children right around Alice's age. Don't know 'em well, but I know it's warmer where they are. I could wire them if you’d like? Betcha they’d take to you like cats to cream.” 

Sissy dips her head onto his shoulder and Bucky wraps his arms around her. She’s fragile as a bird, just like Steve but taller. “That’d be very kind, but I wish you’d consider it.” She sniffles a little and lifts her head to brush away tears. Then she chucks Bucky lightly under the chin.

“Can’t say I’m surprised, though, that you’ve got someone here, tough guy.” 

“Well, they don’t know it,” Bucky says to her scalp. 

Sissy pulls back and look looks at him appraisingly. “Then you should tell her. Handsome fella like you? There’s not a girl in the world who wouldn’t want you.” 

“Yeah….” 

“We’ll make a deal: I’ll go to California and look up these cousins of yours, get Alice out of here, but you have to tell your girl how you feel.” She coughs lightly, and covers her mouth hastily with a fist. “Life’s too short.” 

Bucky sighs miserably. If there’s anyone he can trust it’s Elisabeth Sackler. “What if. What if my someone’s not a girl?” 

“Then you ought to tell _Steve_ how you feel.” 

He boggles at her. “You...how do you…?” 

“Call it a mother’s intuition,  but you can tell him. Trust me, I’ve been around the theatre long enough to know when a fella’s not interested. But you.” She smiles, and kisses him on the cheek, almost at the corner of his mouth. “You’re a curious one.” 

Bucky laughs, and hugs her tighter. It's such a relief, to have someone know, at last, how he feels. His whole body feels lighter. “Never been very good at choosing one or the other of _anything_ ,” he concedes with just a dash of cockiness. Sissy laughs with him. 

\--

A few days later, Steve finds him shirtless and sweaty in the props cage, grunting as he lugs around a bunch of mattresses they’ll be using for an upcoming act. Steve's got his sketchbook, and a worried look on his face that Bucky doesn’t like one bit.

“Sissy said you were down here….that you had something to tell me?” He says, brushing his bangs off his forehead. 

_Dammit._

Bucky drops the mattress he’s dragging, and rubs the back of his neck.

“I guess.” 

“Gonna tell me why you’ve been so off-color lately?” 

“You think I’ve been off-color?” Bucky brings one knuckle to his mouth and worries at it with his front teeth.

Steve makes a disbelieving sound and stares at him. “Hell yes, Buck. You haven’t looked me in the face in weeks, might even be months come to think of it.”

“And I do that a lot? Look at you, I mean?” 

Steve nods, his expression mulish, and Bucky takes a deep breath, then pushes all of the air out of lungs. He shakes his head.

“Guess I do.” 

“It's like you've got some kinda problem with me, and if you do you oughta spit it out already.” Steve swipes his bangs out of his eyes again, and Bucky's stomach twists. It’s one of his favorite things about Steve, the way he’s always fussing with those damn bangs of his. 

“Guess I do have a bit of a problem with you,” he says haltingly, eyes on the ground. “Bit of a problem I don’t know how to fix. And there’s a snowball’s chance in hell that you can help me fix it, that much I know. It’s just―I like you, Steve.” 

“I like you too, Buck, already told ya I think you’re swell. Thought we worked all this out in grammar school." 

“No... _Christ_ , I mean I _like_ you, like a fella might like a dame." Bucky’s lips press into a thin, sad frown, and he forces himself to look at Steve full-on. "I'm...I'm sweet on you."

The concern wrinkling Steve’s brow makes him feel even more foolish, but unfortunately for him, he’s never been the type to do things half-way. 

“And I _know_ it’s bad and I _know_ there’s a special place in hell for guys―for guys like me. And I know I’m an idiot but ever since you started going around with Louise, who is something else lemme tell you, and hanging around here all the time, and I saw how much you liked her I’ve just. I’ve just been _dying_ with it, Stevie. I can’t stop. I can’t stop thinking about you. It’s like I forget who the hell I am if I'm not focused on you and your dumb face, and I... Fuck,” he trails off lamely. 

The silence that follows is endless, until Steve says real quiet, “Louise ain’t my girl."

“She ain't?” Bucky squints at him, heart hammering. 

“Nuh-uh.” 

“So you’re not...making time with her?” 

“Nope.” 

Bucky keeps squinting, waiting for the punch line, because there's gotta be one. 

“Didja think maybe Sissy told you to talk to me because she knew I felt the same? Knew I felt the same way about you?" Steve smiles a little smugly. "Maybe you're not the only one who spills their heart out around here." 

"Holy cow." 

“You’re dumber than a box of rocks, James Barnes,” Steve says, his eyes crinkling up at the sides.

“That’s not nice.” 

“Never been very nice.” 

“Suppose that's the truth.” Bucky nods in agreement. 

Steve might be good, but he's not nice. And now he's stepping unsteadily over the pile of mattresses between them, and getting right close to Bucky, his face earnest.  "But you _gotta_ know," he says, quiet again and very sure, "I've been looking at you with stars in my eyes since we were stupid little kids."

Bucky can't believe he managed to miss something like that. 

"What now?” he asks.

“You could try kissing me, you jerk.” 

“Suppose I could,” Bucky muses, nonchalant, even though his heart is still beating a steady path up his throat. 

“Too slow,” Steve tsks, then closes the distance between them. He wraps his skinny arms around Bucky’s neck, and tilts his head up, lips nearly on Bucky’s. “And here I thought you were the fast one.” 

“ _Me too,_ ” Bucky stutters, and then they’re kissing. And Steve can kiss. He can really, _really_ kiss, which sends Bucky’s mind reeling even as he sloppily, desperately pushes his tongue into Steve’s mouth. They kiss for a long time, Steve on his tip toes with one hand between Bucky’s shoulder blades and the other curved to the back of his skull, keeping him close. 

When they stop, Steve catches his breath, and Bucky lets out a huff of disbelief. They stare at each other, grinning like idiots. 

“Think anyone will find us in here?”  

Steve shakes his head. “Sure don’t.” 

“Then get back here,” Bucky leers. 

Steve does, and it’s crazy, just crazy, Bucky thinks, as Steve lifts his arms above his head and lets Bucky tug off his henley. Steve immediately wraps his arms around his torso, covering himself up, but Bucky won’t have any of that, not when he’s been wanting this so bad.  

“Don’t think so,” he says, shaking his head. “Lemme see you.” 

Steve’s eyes go downcast. “You’ve seen me.”

“Not like this, not when you’ve just been kissing me.” He takes Steve’s wrists gently in his hands and spreads his arms out wide, lets himself drink it all in. Steve is flushed from his cheeks down to his pert little nipples and Bucky’s mouth waters like a starving man faced with a feast. 

“C’mon, Buck,” Steve whines pleadingly, tugging at Bucky’s grip, so Bucky loops Steve's arms back around his neck, where they feel like they belong, and sighs when Steve locks them in place. He shivers when Steve presses his bare chest against his, and groans when Steve brings their mouths together again. 

They stay like that, pressed together like in one of Bucky's more chaste fantasies, until Vogel's booming voice in the distance forces them apart. Hastily they both put their clothes back into place and Steve smiles at Bucky with a such a dirty glint in eyes that it belies his flushed cheeks and shaky breath. Bucky almost drags him right down onto the pile of mattresses, which he really should have done from the start. 

"Get back to work, you bum," Steve says, smirking. Then he drags his teeth over his lower lip in an utterly indecent way, and leaves Bucky with a raging hard-on and an afternoon's worth of backbreaking work. 

Ain't life grand. 

\--

“So all it took to get you to talk to me again like a normal fella was little bit of kissing?” Steve jokes later, his legs draped over Bucky’s on their couch. 

Bucky’s confidence surges for the first time in months. “Little bit more than kissing, wouldn’t you say?” 

“Oh, I dunno.” Steve gives him a coy smile. “Some of those theatre girls taught me a thing or two about what comes after kissing.” 

His whole body visibly jerks of its own accord. That’s something he’s never thought to picture before. “They taught you what now?” 

Steve’s grin widens, and he gets off the couch and onto his knees. “Lemme show you.” 

“Stevie, are you sure you know what you’re doing?” He squeaks when Steve is suddenly undoing his trousers, and his dick is surging to attention as Steve’s clever fingers brush against it through thin fabric. 

“Never been surer,” Steve says, and then he closes his mouth over the head of Bucky’s dick and the world falls away. 

Life is grander than grand. 

\--

Sissy keeps her end of their promise. It's a very grey Valentine’s Day when she tells the whole staff she'll be leaving. 

To no one’s surprise, Vogel cries on her longer and louder than anyone else despite having already known she was going. Bucky, Steve and Louise spend a weekend packing up her place, and thanks to a little help from Bucky (with Steve’s blessing) Sissy’s got a train ticket to California by way of Chicago. She and Alice will be in the golden state before the month is out. The apartment looks just like an office now, but they’ve kept up all the posters. Bucky and Steve get to add a dresser to their measly collection of furniture, and Louise ends up with more scarves than Carter’s has liver pills. 

They all go with her to Grand Central Station. Bucky, Steve and Louise each carrying a trunk, or a box, while Sissy carries Alice who isn’t up for walking long distances. The station is crowded, and smoky, and neither Steve nor Alice have lungs that can handle such foul air. A porter loads in all the luggage, and Louise begins to cry when the conductor calls “all aboard.” Sissy hugs them each in turn. 

“Thank you,” she whispers into Bucky’s hair, her lips against his ear. “Promise you’ll write?” 

“‘Course I will.” He points at Steve, “and this one’ll make sure the envelopes are real decorative.” 

“Take good care of Hans,” Sissy tells Louise, who nods very, very seriously at her and swears she will. 

“Take care of your mama,” Bucky says, as he hugs Alice goodbye. Then he helps Sissy onto the train, and they watch it pull away from the station with Alice’s pale little face pressed against the window, and Sissy wiping away tears. 

Bucky tugs Steve and Louise close to him on either side, and rests his head atop Steve's. Steve offers Louise his hankie. Bucky's accepted that Louise is a part of lives now, which means he has to love her too. He’s realized he’ll always love whomever Steve loves. 

They all wave goodbye together. 

\--

After much deliberation, Bucky gets up the nerve to pick up Steve’s sketchpad and find out what, exactly, he drew all those months ago at the Albee. He starts at the back, and flips past the familiar sketches Steve has already shown him: Sissy holding a healthier looking Alice in her arms, their twin blonde heads tilted together. All the girls grouped across the stage in their finest costumes, plumes of feathers rising up behind them like a glorious flock of birds. Mr. Vogel on the backstage phone, pointer finger raised in protest as he tells off the delivery guys who forgot the dry ice for the magic show _again_. 

And soon, what he was looking for all along: that very first portrait of Louise. She looks stunning, Bucky knew she would. But it doesn’t hurt now, not like it would have before things worked out for him and Steve. Before, seeing her spread out, the erotic tilt of her hips, her full, slack mouth, would have driven him nutty, would have filled him with sharp jealousy: bitter and strong. Now, he sees what Steve saw, a beautiful girl, carefree and willing to sit for him when good models were so hard to come by. Steve had seen an ally when all Bucky could see was a threat; how blind he’d been, how stupidly, unknowingly in love. 

He lingers on the drawing of Louise, and admires Steve’s skill. Vogel would have been a fool not to have hired him, and Bucky is glad he did. Working for the theatre has done wonders for Steve’s confidence. Makes Bucky proud to see him puff up at his own work, to find pleasure in something other than righting the wrongs of the less than righteous. It’s a good outlet, and it keeps Steve’s face from getting roughed up quite as often, that's a gift in and of itself, and it's probably added years to Bucky’s life. Steve sure was doing a number on his prospective lifespan before he fell in with the Albee girls. 

It’s the next page, which Bucky turns to on a whim, that really takes him by surprise. There, more fully rendered than Louise, is his own sleeping form, sprawled out across the overstuffed armchair he’d been relegated to. His legs are akimbo, and his arm is flung across his forehead. He’s slouched at an odd angle and no wonder his damn back had hurt so much when he woke up. Bucky trails his fingers across the page, and sighs. There is so much love in this drawing that it makes his heart hurt. He and Steve could have been a lot more a lot sooner; but he’s never been the best at seeing the forest through the trees, not like Steve, with his uncanny perception. 

If he could tell his Ma how regretful he feels she would say, “no use crying over spilt milk,” and give him a pat on the behind before pushing him out the door—but he can’t, so he settles for closing the sketchbook and putting it back on the table. He thinks of Sissy and Alice, safe in sunny California and the pleasant few postcards he and Steve got when they arrived. Sissy is right, life’s too short. 

Steve will be home from class soon, and there are countless days for them to make up for, and countless ways that Bucky wants to show Steve how much he cares. A home-cooked meal would be a good place to start, he figures, so he gets to it, and counts down the minutes until their countless days begin. 

**Author's Note:**

> Well, that's it friends. I hope you enjoyed, and that it was worth the wait. Love you all x a billion.. 
> 
> The [Domino Sugar Refinery](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domino_Sugar_Refinery_\(Brooklyn\)) is a real place and it is not the docks. Namm's was a real department story in Downtown Brooklyn. The Albee was a real vaudeville theatre in Steve and Bucky's neighborhood, too. If you have any questions about the landscape in this story please don't hesitate to ask me! 
> 
> Find me on [tumblr](http://reserve.tumblr.com) for lots of crying and obsessing over Brooklyn.


End file.
